Pentagon updates US Nuclear Posture Review

"The US Defense Department published the country's nuclear doctrine, which contained absurd assumptions on China's development plans, exaggerating the threat of the Chinese nuclear forces, we strongly oppose this", a statement, published on the ministry's official WeChat account, read.

The NPR asserts that production of low-yield nukes would enhance the credibility of the American nuclear arsenal.

In the U.S. review of nuclear policy released on Friday, the first one since 2010, the Pentagon said China had pursued new nuclear capabilities and challenged USA interests in the Western Pacific.

China "always abides by the principle of no first use of nuclear weapons under any circumstances", Ren said, and will "unconditionally not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon states".

"We must look reality in the eye and see the world as it is, not as we wish it to be", Defence Secretary Jim Mattis says, stressing that "in no way does this approach lower the nuclear threshold".

The Pentagon said last week that the planned tactical warhead for some ballistic missiles and the reintroduction of a nuclear-tipped cruise missile would help to deter a limited nuclear strike.

The new policy - the first update of the Nuclear Posture Review since 2010 - pushes modernization of US nuclear weapons, infrastructure and delivery systems.

China has the world's fifth-largest nuclear arsenal, with 300 warheads, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

American nuclear planners believe potential adversaries overseas, especially Russian Federation, assume America would never use its existing arsenal as the effects would be too devastating and provoke globally catastrophic retaliation.

Zarif said the same impulse was driving the United States to undermine the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, which President Donald Trump has demanded be renegotiated. "In a competitive situation, you also have to hold at risk, in this case, what North Korea holds dear, to remind them, 'Don't do it.

The bomb dropped on Hiroshima was 'low-yield, '" the Nobel Peace Prize-winning nongovernmental organization said. "Only that solution will do".